


The Princess and the Pod

by Spludge237



Category: Blaseball (Video Game)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-23 18:20:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30059589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spludge237/pseuds/Spludge237
Summary: Summers Preston visits the home of the Cell Barajas, and tells the young ones a story.
Relationships: Summers Preston/Stephanie Winters
Kudos: 6





	The Princess and the Pod

High at the top of The Bucket, home field of the Mexico City Wild Wings, you will find the rowdy section of super fans/stadium employees known as The Nest. The Nest owes its existence to the persistent exuberance of Cell Barajas, long-time roster member of the Wild Wings, and a literal harpy who births a new Cell at the conclusion of every blaseball game. This new Cell plays the next game, and so on, and so on, et cetera, et cetera, ad infinitum. The previous Cells, now freed from the obligation/threat of playing blaseball tend not to leave the team initially, finding bonds of companionship with the other players and the ever increasing quantity of Cells. Rather, they appear to be eager to serve as team employees, staffing concession stands and merch booths, cleaning and acting as internal mail carriers, and maintaining their status as one of the less remarkable cryptids in the league. The rapid development of language, shared memory, and culture amongst the Cells would surely have made fascinating linguistic anthropological research, but the ethics review board kept coming back with comments such as “developing culture” and “of disproportionate impact”. But for most fans, the Cells are known for their raucous cheering during home games. Today, in the quiet time between the thirteenth and fourteenth seasons, they were receiving a visitor.

“Tia Summers!”

Summers Preston smiled as she floated up over the edge of The Nest, having been spotted by one of the younger Cells. Identifying the age of a Cell is difficult if you are only using your eyes, but you can quickly get a sense of a Cells age by how they talk. Younger Cells have a palpable air of excitement about them, with so much being new to them while their collective memory develops. As a Cell ages, its individual personality tends to shine through, often based on their experiences in the game they played. This would surely have made fascinating developmental psychological research, but the ethics review board kept coming back with comments such as “effects of diagnostic equipment are unknown on subject” and “consent issues arise under the proposed hivemind hypothesis”. Summers recognised this Cell; there was only one Cell that called her Tia, and she still liked to wear her Light & Sweet cap from the Coffee Cup. Summers drifted across to Cell and faux-officiously said “Captain.” while giving a mock salute. Cell giggled, which brought a smile to Summers’ face; until Cell got tired of the joke, Summers had decided, she wouldn’t get tired of it.

“Hi Cell, is Cell about?” asked Summers. Summers no longer thought it weird that she didn’t have to specify which Cell she was enquiring after, and had long since ceased wondering as to why the Cells had decided on not using some sort of numbering or cataloguing system. They knew who she was talking about, and it worked, and with all the inexplicable things that routinely happen around the sport of blaseball, questioning the benign did not seem like a productive use of her time. The psychotelepathic field that surrounded the Cells to make this feat of communication work would surely have made fascinating cryptobiological research, but the ethics review board kept coming back with comments such as “inhumane” and “if you harm one feather on their heads I will alert the authorities''. Cell smiled at Summers and said, “Yeah, she’s just finished her mail run, she’ll be further up towards the outfield.”, and they slowly started picking their way through the stands in that direction.

“Hey, since Cells that pitch are now a thing, have the younger Cells let up on you a little?” Summers enquired.

“A little.” Cell replied. “Like, they stop looking at me like I’m some sort of freak, but I still don’t really feel like I’m part of the team. I mean, I never even played for the Wild Wings.”

Summers put something that approximated a hand on her shoulder. “Cell, you are a trailblazer. We all saw you pitch in that game and knew we had to find a way to make Cells that pitched a thing that happened on a regular basis. You wouldn’t say that Adkins Gwiffen isn’t a Wing, and they’ve played just as many Wild Wings games as you have.”

“That’s true, I guess.” mused Cell. “I mean, I hadn’t…”

“Summers! Summers! Hi! Hi, Summers, Hi!” A Cell came running up to them, bouncing from talon to talon. “Hi Summers!”

“Well, aren’t you just a precious ball of energy, Cell.” Summers said, trying her best to make eye contact with the near-vibrating harpy. “Tell me, how many Cells have you seen pitch, young one?”

Cell cocked her head. “I’ve not seen any Cells pitch, Miss Summers. I saw Miss Silvia play a game, though.”

Summers took a second to process the information. “Why, you mustn’t’ve even played your game yet! Now, are you making sure you practice every day with Mr. Gonzales?”

Cell’s face lit up, as if the stadium lights were all shining on her. “Oh yes, Miss Summers. Mr. Burke has been a big help! He uses lots of big words, though. Miss Fran and Mr Yong have been good batters for me, and Mr Ronan has been the catcher. It’s been very helpful. I’m so excited to play. I’m kinda scared though. What if I don’t pitch good?”

Summers could see the doubt creeping into Cell's mind. She took a second to make her form slightly smaller to be the same height as the young pitcher. “Do you want to know a secret?” Cell nodded her head enthusiastically. “Well, I’ve been practicing all off-season, too, and I’m going to make sure I hit a lot of runs in your game, ok, so if a pitch goes bad, I’ll make sure it doesn’t cost us. Ok?”

The young Cell gave Summers a hug and a quick kiss on the cheek, or would have if Summers had a physical form. Instead, she just slightly drifted through the edges of Summers’ form before Summers could make it more solid, before scampering away. As Summers returned herself to what most would consider her standing position, she saw that the Cell that she had come to see had walked over to meet her. This Cell did have a distinguishing feature that only about 20 Cells possessed; a pauldron, worn on the right shoulder, part of the Wild WIngs playoff uniform. The playoff Cells tended to keep wearing their pauldron; it was partly a badge of honour, but Summers was also pretty sure they liked the look of it. Summers much preferred the cape that went with the playoff uniform, but was also vaguely aware that it was because she thought that Steph looked quite fetching in it. This Cell was from the championship run of season 7; specifically from game 105, when the Wings faced the Garages and Jaylen Hotdogfingers.

Cell looked Summers up and down. “Well, you certainly have been training. Gathering your winds from far and wide; I wonder where there will be some unseasonably calm weather?” Cell smiled and opened up her wings to invite Summers in for a big hug, which Summers eagerly accepted.”I needed to recover after that peanut I caught” Summers said, in an effort to explain her sudden growth. “I need… I need to be stronger to deal with peanuts.” Cell wrapped her wings around Summers, clutching her as tightly as one can the wind, and said softly, quietly, “We’ll get her out someday, girl.”

“But,” Cell continued, releasing the hug and taking a half-step back, “you didn’t come all the way up here to mope about! How goes the preparations for the season? Are we in with a shot this year?” Summers smiled. “Well, we’ve got a really good team this year. Lots of fresh blood, especially by our standards. But the Wild Low is looking really tough this season, and I’ve heard the Lift have made great strides this off-season as well. Still, as we’ve always said, pase lo que pase. And hey, with all our talented, BNN rated four-star pitcher Cell Barajas, we could cause the odd upset here and there.” Summers looked across at Cell, as they wandered through the seating. “We always knew that you’d be good at pitching. Steph said that one day, she and Raf were in the staff cafeteria when a food fight broke out among some of the younger Cells, and after watching it for a minute or so, Raf pointed out to Steph that the Cells were basically always finding their mark with their throws. Steph knew right there and then that you’d be a fine pitcher.”

Cell gave Summers a gentle smile. “And I’m sure your Stephanie will be a fine batter when she gets the chance.”

“Who’s Stephanie?”

The question rang out over the general din of many conversations, asked with a child-like innocence that none-the-less precipitated a ghastly silence that let the speaker know that they had unwittingly committed a grave social sin. Summers turned to face the owner of the voice, and saw a Cell, probably younger, becoming the centre of an ever expanding void as other Cells moved away from her as if she were contagious. Summers floated down towards her, trying her best to look non-threatening. “Hey,” she cooed, as Cell started to back away from her. “Hey, it’s ok, I’m not upset, I’m not mad. Look at you, you’ve probably only seen, what, five Cells pitch? Your memories are still growing in, aren’t they?”. Cell nervously nodded her head, still unsure of the social protocols at play in the situation. “Well,” Summers continued, “how about you go and gather all the other younger Cells, and I’ll see if I can tell you a story that will help with your memory.

* * *

The sun shone low through the upper windows of The Bucket, as a gathering or the younger Cells found a place to sit in front of the makeshift amphitheatre stage cleared away for Summers to stand in. Looking over the assembled audience, Summers noticed a number of the older Cells starting to gather around the edge of the area; she spotted the Cell she came to see, the Cell that first greeted her, a few Cells with shiny pauldrons from the recent playoff runs, and one or two Cells that carried themselves quite matronly that Summers thought may be as old as season 4, given that Cells older than that tended to find the throng of their kind wearying as they age. As the quiet hum of the expectant crowd began to swell, Summers held up her hand to call for silence, and started to tell her story.

“A long time ago, there was a beautiful princess named Stephanie. Stephanie was a blaseball player, just like you, and like you was a pitcher. Stephanie played on the Wild Wings with some people you’ve met, and some people who since then have gone elsewhere. Now, one day long ago the splort of blaseball returned, and was played all over this great planet. But all was not well in the splort, for the players were watched over by a great and terrible peanut god known as The Shelled One. The Shelled One taught the umpires how to incinerate players, banishing them to the Hall of Flame, and ruled through fear and terror. The Shelled One even figured out how to encase players in peanut shells, taking them away from their teammates and loved ones. Eventually, the players rose up to fight The Shelled One. Both the Charleston Shoe Thieves and the Baltimore Crabs tried fighting it, but The Shelled One summoned the players who had been shelled against their will to defend it, and they were both defeated. Finally, The Monitor led a team made up of incarcerated players, called The Hall Stars, who defeated The Shelled Ones Pods, and with a mighty cronch The Monitor ate The Shelled One, freeing the people from its tyrannical rule. Now, the princess Stephanie was lucky, as she never had to fight for or against The Shelled One, and lived with her teammates on the Wild Wings. But one day, after The Shelled One was defeated, while the princess Stephanie was pitching, one of the players who were manipulated by The Shelled One to defend it radiated a strange energy, and the princess Stephanie was suddenly trapped within a peanut shell. There she remains, until the day the birds can free her. That is why, whenever we play and the sky is full of birds, we all call the birds by saying pspspspspsp, so that they’ll come and free the princess Stephanie.”

The young Cells clapped, and then left to go about their usual evening routine. The Cell Summers had come to see moved besides her, and gently said, “We’ll free her, Summers. You’ll see. We’ll get her out.”. Summers turned to face her friend, and said through a grimace, “We'll get her out. Even if I have to climb down The Monitor’s gullet and beat that damned peanut into oblivion myself.”


End file.
